Worshippers filled Anderson Auditorium this past Sunday, June 14, to celebrate the formal installation of the Rev. Dr. Albert G. “Pete” Peery, Jr. as the sixteenth president of the Mountain Retreat Association [Montreat Conference Center].“I believe it’s significant,” said Peery prior to the service, “that the words we’ll use are adapted from the liturgy used to install a minister of Word and Sacrament as a pastor in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).” In the service, Peery was charged not only to be responsible for the management of the Mountain Retreat Association in its service to the people of God; he was also given responsibility “as a minister of Word and Sacrament to assure that the Word may be rightly proclaimed and the sacraments rightly celebrated here.”
“Psalm 121 was required reading in our household,” said the Rev. Pendleton Peery, pastor at First Presbyterian Church, Shreveport, LA. He and his sister, the Rev. Meg Peery McLaughlin, associate pastor of pastoral care at Village Presbyterian Church, Prairie Village, KS, participated in their father’s installation service, charging him to “…keep things in line here, Dad. But remember that God redefines the lines as God leads us ahead on the journey.” They concluded with words from the Psalm: “The Lord is your keeper. He will keep your going out and your coming in from this time on and forever more.”
Peery, who has served congregations in Georgia and North Carolina for over thirty years, comes to Montreat Conference Center after fourteen years as pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Asheville, NC. For over a decade, he has been serving on the Board of Trustees of St. Andrews Presbyterian College and was the first alumnus to be elected board chair. Peery’s service to the denomination includes service on the staff of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) as a Peace Associate in Europe, where he worked to help churches with reconciliation toward the end of the Cold War. In addition, he served a five year term on the General Assembly’s Nominating Committee.
Peery is married to the Rev. Margaret Barnes Peery, a pastoral counselor in Asheville, who also participated in the service along with guest preacher and long-time family friend of the Peerys, the Rev. Dr. Agnes Norfleet, pastor of Shandon Presbyterian Church, Columbia, SC.
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